Wellington chef serves up jellyfish in effort to combat overpopulation

Jellyfish are flourishing in the world's oceans, washing up on beaches, causing a major problem for fisheries.

"It happens as a consequence of the vagaries of tides, winds, currents, season plankton blooms and all of that so it's somewhat unpredictable," said NIWA jellyfish specialist, Dr Dennis Gordon.

The plankton blooms are the result of pollution, as well as warmer waters from climate change.

Most fish will struggle in the conditions, but jellyfish thrive.

"It effects the environment in terms of there being too many jellyfish, they're then competing with fisheries because the jellyfish consume the eggs and the larvae and the baby fish that other fisheries rely on, so they are directly competing," said Dr Gordon.

Few species eat jellyfish.

Turtles do, but they get them confused with plastic bags and can die.

While the likes of tuna are being over-fished and can't keep up with the jellyfish bloom.

So The Larder owner, Jacob Brown has decided to do some pest control.

"I think it's almost a sin that we've got tuna on our menus, unsustainable and being over fished and we don't have jellyfish which is abundant," he said.

The Wellington chef first started serving jellyfish three years ago.

"If you can imagine a cucumber that's been soaked in the sea so it's crunchy and briney and pretty unflavoursome, so it takes on whatever flavour you want to throw at it really," he said describing the taste of jellyfish.

It's full of protein, low in fat, and possibly the new superfood needed to deal with this growing problem.

Unlike most fish jellyfish are thriving in warmer waters and pollution caused by climate change, so one chef's on a pest control mission.
Source: 1 NEWS